Tuesday, January 07, 2014

Medicinal Bacon.

I
know that many of you consider bacon to be the ultimate comfort food, but have
you ever considered its actual medicinal use?In the past, bacon featured in many remedies for specific medical
problems – although sadly for bacon-lovers, most of the applications were just
that – applications for external use only.

From
Eighteen books of the secrets of art and
nature: being the summe and substance of natural philosophy, methodology
digested, [ English translation] by Johann Jacob Wecker, published in 1661,
I give you two recipe-remedies, the first for gout, the second for an infected
finger:

To cure the knots of the
Joynt-Gowt.

If rotten wormeaten
Cheese be moulded with broth wherein a gammon of Bacon hath been long boyled,
it will take away the knots of the Joynt-gowt without any Instrument, if it be
laid on for a Plaister, as Galen
saith; and Coccus Gnidius will
wonderfully do the same beaten with Myrrh and Vinegar.

Fellon to kill.

Take new rusty Bacon,
Snails with Shells, and Leaven, of each alike; pound these together, apply it
to the place, and it will draw and break it. Lady Camden.

[A felon or fellon in
this context means a painful infection or “boil” nof the end of a finger, often
involving the bone.]

It
seems that the concept of bacon as an externally-applied anti-inflammatory
medication was still known in the late nineteenth century:

For Sore Throat.

Cut slices of salt pork
or fat bacon; simmer a few moments in hot vinegar, and apply to the throat as
hot as possible. When this is taken off, as the throat is relieved, put around
a bandage of soft flannel. A gargle of equal parts of borax and alum, dissolved
in water, is also excellent. To be used frequently.

We
must of course have some edible bacon today too - so, from The Whole Duty of a Woman, Or, An Infallible Guide to the Fair Sex:
Containing Rules, Directions, and Observations, for Their Conduct and Behavior
Through All Ages and Circumstances of Life, as Virgins, Wives, Or Widows : with
... Rules and Receipts in Every Kind of Cookery, published in 1737, I give
you a very fine Bacon Pudding – or is it a Pie?.

A Bacon Pudding.

Boil a Quart of Cream
with a Handful of Sugar, and a little Butter; the Yolks of eight Eggs, and
three Whites, beat together, with three Spoonfuls of Flour, and and two
Spoonfuls of Cream; when the Cream boils,
put in the Eggs, stirring it 'till it
comes to be thick, and put it in a Dish and let it cool; then beat a Piece of
fat Bacon in a Stone Mortar, 'till it comes to be like Lard, take out all the
Strings from it, and put your Cream to it by little and little 'till it is well
mixed; then put some Puff-paste round the Brim of your Dish, and a thin Leaf at
Bottom, and pour it into the Dish. Do the Top Chequerwise with Puffpaste, and
let it bake half an Hour.